Tough Baby (Martin Fender Novel) (16 page)

“I wanna know why is it you can’t tell me what the scales are,” he said, slurping the coffee and whiskey, eyeing me across the cup suspiciously.

“You mean the major and minor scales?”

“No, you know what I mean. How some songs have these flatted thirds and sevenths, and some don’t. How some songs have them both flatted and natural. I mean, you showed me these keys, and hardly any of these songs we’ve been learning follow them.”

“Well, besides the major and minor, there are modes. There’s the mixolydian mode, there’s also what we call the blues scale, which we’ve been using a lot, especially in songs like ‘Linda Lu.’ ” I tried to look smug and authoritative, but I could see by his hostile expression that it wasn’t working.

“You mean I gotta learn a whole new scale or mode for every song?”

“No. Just listen to the guitar player and the basic melody, the chords. It’s just the way it is. Sometimes you might have a half step instead of a whole step so you can lead into the next chord. Or you might have your flatted sevenths happening when you’re doing a walking bass pattern and you’re descending down to the root note of the next chord.”

He was shaking his head. “Goddamn, it just doesn’t seem like there’re any rules to this shit. How am I supposed to learn how to do it if every time I learn something, I find out that that’s not necessarily the way it is?”

“If you’re just worried about memorizing the notes, we could get some little round stickers and stick them to the fret board, and write the names of the notes on them.”

“Fuck you.”

“You’ve just got to be flexible, Lasko. Go with the flow.” That seemed to irritate him even more. He sighed and nodded, relaxing his grip on the bass. “Go with the flow, huh.”

“Yeah, just think about the song, instead of the rules, think about—”

“I know what ‘go with the flow’ means, Martin.”

I studied the wrinkles around his tired eyes, the pallor in his cheeks. “Not making your police work any easier, though. Is it?”

“No, it ain’t. I been trying to go with the flow on this Retha Thomas thing, and so far, it ain’t working. But we don’t have a hell of a lot to go on.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Well, no. Not exactly. Actually, I wanted to tell you, we found out some more stuff you might be interested in, seeing as how you and Vick Travis are so buddy-buddy these days.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? You’re the one suggested I go to him and apologize.”

“I didn’t mean you should move in with the guy,” he said, making a face. “I’ve seen your car there two, three times this week now. But whatever, it’s your goddamn business. What we found was that Donald Rollins evidently got a spike full of brown tar or china white and went for a walk and either jumped or fell in. I know it sounds suspicious, but the ground was all wet and there’s only one set of footprints. We haven’t got all the reports back from the lab, but some of the whip marks on his back were months old.”

He paused and watched my reaction. I thought about what he said, but I just couldn’t do anything with the information.

Lasko shrugged. “What can I say? I don’t know what to make of it. But there are all kinds of people out there, people like Donald Rollins, people who look for people like Donald Rollins. The X rays did reveal that he had a broken arm about a year ago. I thought you might be interested to know who paid the emergency room bill.”

“This is what you wanted me to know about Vick?”

He nodded. “Probably doesn’t mean anything.”

But it did mean something. It didn’t seem pertinent to Retha’s case, but it put a darker shadow over Vick’s way of “helping out” people in the music scene. Evidently Donald Rollins had been late in paying back one of Vick’s loans, and a broken arm had been Vick’s way of “working it out.” Then he must have felt bad about it and paid the hospital bill. But Lasko didn’t seem to know about that. He was still talking.

“Old Vick’s been around forever, right?” he went on, and I couldn’t tell whether he was being sarcastic or not. “Sort of a fatherly type. I know two, three guitar players he’s given guitars to. I’m kind of surprised he hasn’t given you a bass since you’re one shy these days.” He glanced down at his watch, not waiting for my reply, and said, “Oops, I need to get back. Say, Watson did give you a call, didn’t he?”

“Watson?”

“Detective Watson. A born-again hard-ass from Abilene. His daddy was a Texas Ranger and he’s currently the Lieutenant’s fair-haired boy.”

“I sense a conflict.”

“Conflict? Hell, he only thinks liquor, cigarettes, and rock and roll are the tools of Satan. His idea of New Wave was Jim Bakker. No, hell, there’s no conflict. Anyway, he was supposed to call you.”

“Well, he didn’t. What’s it about?”

“The cab driver. A witness for you.”

“Regarding what?”

“Regarding Sunday night, or should I say, Monday morning. A driver for Harlem Cabs helped Retha Thomas carry you down the hall here to your apartment. He just happened to be dropping off a fare in your building when she drove up. She gave him twenty bucks.”

It was like a drink of cold water. I was surprised at the degree of relief I felt. “Damn, that makes a difference. But how’d she know where I lived? I don’t remember a damn thing after we left the party.”

“Maybe she looked at your driver’s license. Maybe she pulled over another drunk and asked him, I don’t know.”

“Well, whatever. It sure eases my mind.”

“I reckon it eases both our minds. As for her having your bass, I guess she forgot she had it, or maybe she was hoping you’d come by for it.”

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me sooner.”

“Sorry, Martin. I’ve had troubles of my own, and Watson was supposed to call you. Guess he’s been too busy.” He was bent over, putting his bass back in the case, so I couldn’t see his face. Once again, it was hard to tell if he was being sarcastic or sincere. As he snapped the latches shut he looked up. “You’re gonna have to get your case fixed, too. Evidently it got jammed in her trunk and she couldn’t get it out. The latches broke off, and she just left it in the car, carried the bass up to her room. Maybe somebody saw her carry the bass up to her room like that, tried to take it from her.”

“Oh, come on.”

He shrugged. “Nah, I don’t go for that either.”

“So do you have any leads?”

“Nothing I can discuss with you. Besides, it’s not really my case anymore.”

“What do you mean by ‘not really’?”

“I guess I’m trying to say the Lieutenant assigned it to Watson.” He didn’t seem very disturbed about it, but he wouldn’t

look me in the eye. “Besides,” he said, sighing, “it’s not really a homicide. Not yet.”

“Did you talk to Barbra Quiero?”

“Yeah. Typical LA brat, ain’t she? She comes on like she knows everybody and everything, but doesn’t know anything that can do us any good.”

“She does come on pretty strong.”

He shook his head, frowning. “She’s too skinny, Martin. I don’t trust women like that. They ain’t gonna keep you warm on a cold winter night. But it never does get cold in LA, does it?”

Before I could answer, the phone rang. He tried to look disinterested, tugging on the cuffs of the blazer, trying to make it look like it fit. But it never would.

I answered the phone. It was Ladonna. She’d just gotten the flowers. I gave Lasko a good-bye wave.

&&&

I showered and shaved. Ladonna was going to take the afternoon off. As I finished dressing I made mental notes. I had a lot of things to do. I wanted to talk to the Thomases to see if they could help me find Retha’s boyfriend. I needed to call Leo again. It looked like I was going to have to find a saxophonist. I needed to talk to Vick. But none of these things felt as urgent as seeing Ladonna. I was tying my shoes when the front door swung open. It was Leo.

He looked slightly more rested than the day before, and his hair had been in the vicinity of a comb in the last few hours. He was clean shaven in a white T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers, but when he took off his shades and shook hands with me, I could see that his eyes were still a little puffy.

“How’d it go?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Dinner went OK. Spent sixty-nine dollars at Fonda San Miguel. We talked and stuff.”

“Call a cease-fire?”

“I don’t know, Martin. I thought maybe we were getting there, but just now when I was driving her to work I got pulled over.” He sighed and rolled his eyes. “My license is suspended, you know.”

“Outstanding warrants?”

He nodded. “She ended up being two hours late for work ’cause she had to run to the bank so she could bail me out of jail. So she’s pissed again. She wants me to give up the Flying V. Fuck that, man, I’ve always wanted a guitar like that.”

I didn’t say anything. He dug the American Express card out of his pocket and handed it over. “I don’t know if it was worth it or not, but I appreciate the gesture. I’m trying, man, I really am. By the way, something I wanted to tell you. It’s about this Retha Thomas deal.”

“What?”

He took a labored breath and looked down, not at the floor but not at my face either. “I know you probably have some suspicions about Vick and Ed, but don’t hassle them. They didn’t have nothing to do with it.”

“How would you know?”

“I was with them. Me and Ed left that party not long after you did. I was with them till sunrise.”

“So this is something you could testify to in court?”

“No. Why should I? I just told you they didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“What were you guys doing?”

“None of your business. Just doing some Cuervo shots, mostly.”

“That wouldn’t sound so bad in court,” I said. I watched his face grow more pallid. He put his shades on and headed for the door. “I just wanted to let you know, Martin, so you don’t go barking up the wrong tree, pestering people who didn’t have nothing to do with anything.”

“Nothing at all?” I said.

“Nothing.” His hand was on the doorknob, the sunglasses obscuring his eyes.

“Was Donald Rollins with you the other night?”

“Hell, no,” he snorted. “I told you, it was just me and them two.” He swung the door open.

“You know, Leo, remember when you told me about when you used to shoot at the moon?” He nodded. “You never worried about those bullets falling on somebody else’s house, did you?”

He just shrugged and left.

&&&

I had a few minutes to kill before Ladonna would get home, so I made some phone calls. I reached Mr. Thomas at the hospital. Retha was no better, no worse. I asked if he or his wife knew the guy that Retha had been seeing. They didn’t even know she’d been dating anyone. It was starting to bother me that no one seemed to know much about her. Not her parents, not even her friend, Barbra. When I called the Hyatt, they said Ms. Quiero checked out.

Maybe she’d gone back to LA. I still had a few minutes to kill so I tried reading the paper. There was a short story on page two about Bingo Torres’s legal troubles. More record company promotion people and deejays were being questioned about their links to Bingo. Next to the story was a hotel ad offering weekend discounts. It gave me an idea. I called La Quinta and asked for the manager. A man with a soothing baritone came on the line that sounded as if it would please him greatly if he could help me.

I let him know that it would please me, too, in a tone that implied that I expected it, nonetheless. “This is M. Fender down at Lone Star Detectives and Collection Agency. I’m sorting out the last credit charges of a Miss Retha Ann Thomas, who was attacked at your motel last Sunday night. Her father asked for our assistance in clearing up any outstanding bills, things of that nature.”

There was a muffled sound as he cleared his throat. “Ah, yes, let me check.” He put me on hold and came back on the line a minute later. “Mr. Fender, what sort of irregularities were you looking for? Her bill was paid in full, according to my night manager.”

“Well, as you can guess, since there are some questions about what happened, it might be helpful to know how this bill was paid. Credit card, cash . . .”

“Oh, I see. I wonder, could I call you back? We’ve got a tour bus pulling in the drive just now. I’ll gladly call you back at the first opportunity.”

I gave him my number. After I hung up, I looked down at the newspaper. One story caught my eye. The headline read: SURGEONS TAKE LARGE TUMOR OUT OF WOMAN. I scanned the text below. A severely overweight woman in California had tried dieting and exercise, resulting in a loss of fifty-five pounds, but she was still grossly overweight, and her midsection refused to taper. After she began bleeding last Friday night, she went to the emergency room and was referred to a gynecologist, who recommended surgery. The next morning, surgeons removed a thirty-pound, watermelon-size tumor from her uterus. It took two surgeons to lift it out. The patient, questioned the day after surgery, was said to be in good spirits, even though tests to determine whether the tumor was malignant had not been completed. She knew before that she was experiencing serious health problems due to her obesity, but now she was relieved to find that something else was wrong. “Who would have known,” she said, “that something like that was growing in there?”

I found the story troubling. It was the kind of mundane trivia that seemed to hint at some sort of universal truth. Maybe if I’d had more time on my hands, I could have deciphered its meaning and worked it into a blues song, but it was time to go.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

“I’m glad you got a witness,” said Ladonna. “I’m sorry the way I acted, I guess I made you feel even worse.”